The Googled ethnographer
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to consider how researcher positionality is reconfigured by internet use.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on recent ethnographic studies conducted in Australia and Canada, the paper considers here how participant agency is symbolically and materially enacted through technology use.
Findings
The use of information communication technologies by researchers, research participants and industry partners in online information searching, and the production and dissemination of text poses challenges to conventional assumptions of unequal power relations in research sites.
Research limitations/implications
The paper explores methodological, theoretical and practical implications of being a Googled ethnographer whose life, work, professional activities and networks as represented online are available for public scrutiny.
Originality/value
The paper argues, taking inspiration from Sarah Pink's recent work, that the author's and others’ use of information and communication technologies implicates us in shared “entanglements” of responsibility within and beyond research sites. The importance of these entanglements for contemporary thinking about researcher positionality, research relationships and researched/researching subjectivities is also considered.
Keywords
Citation
Saltmarsh, S. (2013), "The Googled ethnographer", Qualitative Research Journal, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 236-243. https://doi.org/10.1108/QRJ-12-2012-0034
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2013, Emerald Group Publishing Limited